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Funeral Set for Beloved Dancer as Police Search for Killer

Students and fellow dancers reflect on the influence that Darrell Cleveland had on the North Texas dance scene. (Published Friday, Aug. 4, 2017)

Funeral services are planned in Florida for 45-year-old Darrell Cleveland, a beloved Dallas-area dancer who was shot and killed early in the morning on July 23 at the corner of Cadiz and Ervay streets in downtown Dallas.

Police are still looking for his killer.

"Things you can't fathom, explain," said Nycole Ray, artistic director of the Dallas Black Dance Theatre Encore. "We will miss his gift of sharing and passing on knowledge."

Ray helped recruit Cleveland to the Dallas Black Dance Theatre in the 1990s.

"His body was so malleable and his presence was beyond those four walls," Ray said. "And Darrell had the most infectious smile you'd ever seen. Just big, bright and beautiful!"

"The passion he had for his students is something that inspires me to this day as a teacher and as a dancer," said Alysia Johnson, a former student of Cleveland's. "We respected him as a teacher. We respected him as a performer because he led by example."

Johnson is now a student at Julliard. She has been teaching a workshop called Energeizing Dancers of Dallas at the Dallas Black Dance Theatre Academy. Cleveland was her first jazz teacher when she was just 9 years old.